I just happened to be thinking about the Olympics today and a memory hit me, so you get to share.

The 1908 games (IV Olympiad of the modern games) were held in London in 1908 and were very contentious. The trouble started early and continued all the way through the Marathon. The trouble started when US officials noticed there was no United States flag displayed with the others. Neither was Sweden’s, they stormed out of the stadium.

But all’s well that ends well. A new piece of US flag protocol came out of this contretemps.

U.S. flag bearer and discus champion Martin Sheridan responded by refusing to dip the Stars and Stripes when he passed King Edward VII‘s box in the parade of athletes. “This flag dips to no earthly king, or potentate” Sheridan said. And it hasn’t since.

A Reminder of Our Heritage

It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern.

But that reasoning cannot be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people.

Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.